After being away from the studio for a couple months while planning, thinking, re-evaluating, prepping and gathering supplies, I'm finally almost ready to get back to the actual, physical printing part of the whole screenprinting process with a new direction in mind. Stepping back (or forward?) from a lot of my previous work, I've decided to try something fresh, new, and different than some of the things I feel like I was getting too comfortable with in my art. As to what those "things" are and what this deviation will evolve into, I'm not 100% sure at this point in time.
I DO know this: even though it was always there, "things" were starting to lose the sense of presence of a human hand. Screenprinting can be difficult in that way if you let it be just because of the sheer nature of the process and the boundary between what is possible and what isn't. In its separated form, everything has to be either black or white, with no gray areas in between. In turn, it has the trademark of creating an image that is so perfectly crisp, bold, and mechanical-looking. But then again, that's what I like so much about it...
So, where do we go from here? I'm looking to somehow mix the calculated, deliberate, and planned with the spontaneous, sporadic, free-flowing and unpredictable. I want to combine all of these factors with the usual influences from music, poster art, and album art (this print will be square) onto a sheet of paper that's larger than I've ever used before. Regardless, I think that a substantial amount of the things that have always been there will uncontrollably show through. Let's just see how all these forces come together in visual form. Stay tuned.
Posted by M. Johnson.